Beyond Fixing: Applying the Social Model of Disability in Health Care Practice

"Beyond Fixing: Applying the Social Model of Disability in Health Care Practice

Health professions training tends to center the medical model of disability, which frames difference as something to diagnose, treat, and ideally eliminate. But decades of research across disciplines suggest that quality of life outcomes depend just as much on how clinicians understand and relate to disability as on the interventions themselves.

In this presentation, Dr. Cody Dew, Assistant Professor of Speech-Language Pathology at Binghamton University, explores the tension between the medical and social models of disability and what it looks like in practice when clinicians learn to hold both. Drawing on examples across health professions and using communication disorders as a central case study, Dr. Dew examines how shifting the clinical lens from fixing to understanding can transform outcomes for the people we serve.

As a person who stutters, a licensed SLP, and a researcher whose work centers psychosocial outcomes, Dr. Dew brings both professional expertise and lived experience to this conversation. This presentation is relevant to students and practitioners across all health professions who work with people living with disability, chronic conditions, or communication differences.

Attendees will leave with a clearer framework for integrating the social model into their own clinical practice, regardless of their specialty."

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